History of the Japanese in Los Angeles
Japanese people began arriving in the United States in the late 1800s and have settled in places like Hawaii, Alaska, and California.
[1] Following the passage of the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882, Japanese immigration to the United States increased drastically to fill the resulting labor void.
Japanese immigrants were once recruited to come to the United States to take on jobs on railroads but quickly turned to agriculture as a means of work in Southern California.
In 1905, the Los Angeles Herald-Examiner published an article on the “yellow peril” and related it to Japanese immigrants, as its original creation was against people of Chinese descent.
[5] The early 1900s saw an increase of racism and xenophobia in California to the point where Asian children were being segregated in public schools in San Francisco.
[4] After the 1906 earthquake in Northern California, around 2,000-3,000 Japanese immigrants moved to Los Angeles and created areas like Little Tokyo on East Alameda.
[2] Boyle Heights was Los Angeles’s largest residential communities of Japanese immigrants and Americans, apart from Little Tokyo.
In the early 1910s, Boyle Heights was one of the only communities that did not have restricted housing covenants that discriminated against Japanese and other people of color.
[7] Further south, on Terminal Island in Los Angeles Harbor, a Japanese American fishing community was established, starting around 1906.
[3] Not long after the attack on Pearl Harbor, President Roosevelt issued Executive Order 9066, which authorized military commanders to exclude "any or all persons" from certain areas in the name of national defense, the Western Defense Command began ordering Japanese Americans living on the West Coast to present themselves for "evacuation" from the newly created military zones.
Notably, Boyle Heights, just east of Little Tokyo, had a large Japanese American population in the 1950s (as it had before the internment) until the arrival of Mexican and Latino immigrants replaced most of them.
Jack Fujimoto, author of Sawtelle: West Los Angeles's Japantown, wrote that the name was given because of the "many colorful eateries and shops.
A large Japanese American settlement ensued, which can still be found along Coliseum Street, east and west of Crenshaw Boulevard.
[14] In the pre-World War II period the South Bay region was one of the few areas that allowed non-U.S. citizens to acquire property, so a Japanese presence came.
Toyota moved its operations to its Torrance campus in 1982 because of its proximity to the Port of Long Beach and Los Angeles International Airport, and it was followed by many other Japanese companies.
[17] Jack Rodman, a managing partner of the accounting firm Kenneth Leventhal & Co., stated in 1989 that the most preferred place for Japanese businesspeople to settle is the Palos Verdes Peninsula, citing the inexpensiveness compared to Bel Air, Brentwood, and Pacific Palisades, proximity to the ocean, and the ranch-style houses because they are "more like a Japanese home--single-story, spread out.
[19] In 1986 Hiroshi Matsuoka, the Japan Business Association of Southern California (JBA, 南カリフォルニア日系企業協会 Minami Kariforunia Nikkei Kigyō Kyōkai) executive director, stated that there were about 3,500 Japanese nationals working for 530 branch companies of Japanese companies in the Los Angeles metropolitan area.
[21] In 1989, Sadao "Bill" Kita, the executive director of the JBA, stated that there were 693 Japanese companies with offices in Southern California.
[21] As of 1987 the Southern California Conference of Seventh-day Adventists does outreach to the Japanese community by sponsoring the East-West School.
[37] The Rafu Chuo Gakuen is a part time Japanese language school that is located Saratoga Street in Boyle Heights.
The community center features the George J. Doizaki Gallery, the 880-seat Aratani/Japan America Theatre, the JACCC Plaza (designed by Isamu Noguchi), and the James Irvine Japanese Garden.
Additionally, the Go For Broke Monument, which commemorates Japanese Americans who served in the United States Army during World War II is located on the north side of Little Tokyo, behind the museum.
Today, most locations have become centers for cultural exchange and can be found in Venice, Long Beach, Sun Valley, and in other neighborhoods with historically large Japanese populations.
